April 2008 Archives

The big guns are definitely out to get him. Like prize fighters who detect a weakness in their opponent, Hillary Clinton and John McCain are pounding away at the Democrats leading contender for the Presidential nomination, hoping to cripple him on their march to fantasized victory. They bring up Rev. Jeremiah Wright, play the race card, say he's too weak to take on Osama.

And it seems to be working. Somehow the media is perceiving Obama to be a loser because he can't "close the deal" against Hillary Clinton. Eventhough he's actually ahead and on target to close it some time between now and the August convention. The only point in question is when not if. He has a seemingly insurmountable lead that could only be derailed by some scandal or gaffe of summit-like proportions. And that's what everyone's waiting for. Makes for good TV and keeps the ratings up. The media is not evil in this way. They are as their DNA made them, doing what comes naturally in their own self interest.

Obama is no longer scripting the story as well as he was in the early days. Like the military pundits paraded out on the national news shows, the media seems to be taking its lead story off Clinton campaign talking points. Negative campaigning serves the media interest because it provides a better story than the finer points of health care policy.

As Maureen Dowd astutely observed, Hillary looks all energized and ready for action, while Obama is like a fighter in the 8th round of a 15 round title fight. Tired, in search of a plan that served him well in the early rounds, but has since deserted him, He needs a second act and second wind to go with it?

And so do we, the electorate, need a high potency protein shake to get over a creeping case of primary fatigue. Rookies that many of us are at the game, drawn into it as much by the charisma and message of Barack Obama as by any inherent obligation to be good citizens, we jumped in early and gave it our all and now we're tired. Pros pace themselves knowing that they're going to need the energy to make it to the finish line. We need to regain our focus.

McCain spouts inanities like "Obama is Hamas choice for President" and "I will be Hamas' worst nightmare." And Hillary lets him get away with hit, collaborating with the enemy in her silent acquiescence.

The task for Obama is to get control of the narrative, the story line, the sound bite that plays it just the rght way. To get back on message about his campaign for hope and change and away from the machine politics that drives America and consumes the soul of Clinton and McCain. His strength lies in painting the big picture, a picture of hope that has invigorated millions of Americans. The wonk that he is, he can get down and dirty on poicy minutaie, but when he does he plays by their rules and he loses. His message must transcend politics and appeal to our better instincts. Barack Obama can only win on his own terms. It's not abut Jeremiah Wright or anything else that comes up along the way. It's how he handles himself in the trenches that matters. He's got to take the heat and come out caring and cool.

Obama poster created by Morning Breath. Available at Uppperplayground.

Do you remember "Mission Accomplished", the pithy little phrase that adorns this photograph? The photograph was taken on May 23, 2003, the day that George Bush "landed" on the USS Abraham Lincoln, all dressed up in fighter pilot gear, to announce the United States' victory in Iraq.

I've been against the invasion the Iraq from the very beginning and I still feel in my bones the horror at seeing such a lie gleefully broadcast across not just all major media in the United States, but all over the world. I knew, as many other antiwar activists did, that the banner was a lie and that it was a lie intended to confuse and distract from the truth of the occupation. Yet it is still scandalous that media outlets like The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC and the very pro-BushCo media outlet, Fox News went into the lie knowingly.

Back on 20th February 2002, the BBC published a report titled, Pentagon plans propaganda war. In it Tom Carver reported the following :

The Pentagon is toying with the idea of black propaganda.

As part of George Bush's war on terrorism, the military is thinking of planting propaganda and misleading stories in the international media.

A new department has been set up inside the Pentagon with the Orwellian title of the Office of Strategic Influence.

It is well funded, is being run by a general and its aim is to influence public opinion abroad.

Now comes word that the BBC report was wrong on one count. The Pentagon didn't want to just manipulate the media internationally. President George Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld knew rather well that the war they were waging was here on U.S. soil.

The New York Times just published a report titled, MESSAGE MACHINE | Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon's Hidden Hand. It describes how the Pentagon used and/or deployed retired military officers to appear on US TV news shows as "unbiased" military analysts. By exploiting the reputation of some of these decorated generals, the Bush administration unleashed a disinformation campaign on the Unites States public, especially when accusations of human rights abuses in Guantánamo Bay were turned into lawsuits against the government.

Some of the analysts didn't react immediately to the manipulation because they allegedly didn't see any conflict of interest. Yet others seem to have been fully aware of it, especially those who were working for companies benefiting from the war with military contracts. One of the generals went even as far as promoting his ties to the government on marketing materials for his military consultancy company.

It's a powerful report that needs to be read carefully. Yet is it too little too late, coming from The New York Times?

This is the same newspaper that had hired Judith Miller, the infamous NYT journalist and alleged expert on Middle Eastern affairs who published the false report about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. These were one of a series of "unbiased" reports used by the Pentagon to launch the occupation of Iraq.

Either way, the report was felt as a major earthquake on Capitol Hill and the news media world. The New York Times now reports that the Pentagon has stopped "briefing" military analysts that work on broadcast and cable news; pending an internal review.

With all these stories, I am still amazed when people incredulously question the need for an alternative media and especially bloggers.

A hell of a lot happened forty years ago this spring. Martin Luther King Jr. was assinated in April, Robert Kennedy was killed in June, Columbia University students took over their school in protest of the Vietnam War, and the so-called "Prague Spring" -- a series of revolts in Czechoslovakia against Soviet domination -- spanned from January to August of 1968.

Among these uprisings were the famous student riots in Paris, from May to June, chronicled by Bernardo Bertolucci in his 2003 feature film The Dreamers.

Protesting the Vietnam War, university policies, and the overall state of the world, the students in those riots were largely influenced by their national cinema -- namely the French New Wave. The directors of that group -- Jean-Luc Godard, Francoise Truffault, Eric Rohmer, Claude Chabrol, and others -- not only chose revolutionary themes, but revolutionized cinema as well.

Their use of on-location, documentary-style shooting, non-professional actors, and hip, frenetic editing, as well as their prototypical postmodern approach to story-telling, influenced filmmakers worldwide. In the United States, the 1960s saw an explosion of counter-cultural cinema from the likes of Dennis Hopper, Arthur Penn, Martin Scorsese, and John Cassavetes, to name just a few.

And for the first few weeks of May, should you find yourself in New York, you can see first-hand what all the fuss was about. Catch the early works of Godard at Film Forum, in Lower Manhattan, and see the films Godard and his New Wave compatriots inspired at Lincoln Plaza.

These cinematic archives are not merely exceptional works of art, but proof that art has immense power to inspire, provoke, and bring about radical social change.

At its simplest level, my motivation for creating this photo was killing time. In the Texas House of Representatives, guests and reporters watch the proceedings from the balcony. On this day I was posted up there waiting for the Reps to get back from lunch. Luckily, I had my point-and-shoot digital camera in my pocket and got this shot. I thought it captured the sense of anticipation at the beginning of a legislative session well.

I Don't Want to Blow You Up is a new coloring book intended to teach a very simple lesson: Not all Muslims are terrorists.

Conceived and written by Ricardo Cortes and Bowman Hastie, who previously collaborated on Just a Plant, another coloring book about the benefits of hemp, I Don't Want to Blow You Up features several Muslim men and women -- some of whom are famous -- a short bio, and the simple declaration that they don't want to blow you up.

The book found itself under fire even before it got published, and one of its main subjects -- basketball icon Kareem Abdul-Jabbar -- demanded to be omitted from its pages. This set back its publishing date by several months, from November 2007 to February 2008. We caught up with Mr. Cortes to ask him about the book, its arduous journey to print, and the message he hopes it will send to the increasingly xenophobic, anti-Muslim West.

What led you from a book about marijuana to one about Muslims?

I found a lot of similarities between the "War on Drugs" and the "War on Terror" that is our current obsession. Both have created a culture of fear based on false and inflammatory propaganda, and both involve children in how they perceive the world around them as they mature.


When did you begin working on the book, and what was your primary motivation?

My co-author Bowman Hastie and myself were hanging out at the edge of a pier on the Hudson River, some time in late 2006. Neither of us can remember the exact conversation, but it must have had something to do with life in post-9/11 New York City. We might have been discussing the color coded "Terror Alert" system developed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, or the growing political concern over "immigration reform", or the added security measures we've all had to endure at airports. We might have been talking about our own suspicions and fears, and possibly recounting some personal instance of catching ourselves scrutinizing a person on the subway because they appeared to be Arab or Muslim. We might have been trying to imagine what must go through the minds of people who have taken the brunt of these fears and suspicions, and even hate, in recent years. The title of the book derives from our imagined sentiment of someone who is absolutely innocent yet still must face this sort of distrust and hostility from so many people they encounter, day in and day out. The statement, as we imagined it, is incredulous and defiant: "I don't want to blow you up!"

What is the book's basic message?

The basic message is: in the face of fear and hysteria that saturates much of what we hear in the media about people who are of a different culture, religion, etc., give someone the benefit of the doubt that they are in fact an interesting and peaceful person.

How do you think the form you chose -- a coloring book -- helps communicate that message?

Storybooks can often come across as didactic or romantic, two things we wanted to avoid. We didn't want to burden the reader with too much text, but we wanted the book to be reality-based, which is why we chose to offer this selection of mini-biographies. By making it a coloring book, we're gearing the book to kids, and also to adults who might appreciate exploring this serious topic without all the grim statistics and tales of injustice that so often accompany it. A coloring book also invites the reader to interact more with the book. To spend more time ruminating, not just reading.

Is the book really for kids? Please feel free to explain/contradict/qualify/etc.

Sure! The book is for kids, although I won't deny the ability of an incendiary book title like ours to be able to crack into the adult public's eye or even into media queries such as this very interview. What's important to us is that once we engage adults with the conversation and spark that debate, we simultaneously provide their children with an authentic and intelligent story that stands on its own. While it's great to be able to pierce the zeitgeist with a shock, once the smoke clears there's still a child reading the story, and we hope we've created a book that is fun, and can educate in a manner that runs much deeper than mere provocation.

That said, this is a book dealing with a complex set of issues; parents would be encouraged to read the story with their kids.

Did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's reaction surprise you?

Controversy is bound to come up when dealing with such a serious issue. It's difficult to deal with incendiary issues without pushing the bounds of comfort. Terrorism and war isn't a comfortable issue in the first place, and feathers are sure to be ruffled. For example, Mr. Abdul-Jabbar is an impressive man with a very positive history and could be an excellent role model for children. We described him in the book for these reasons. For whatever reason, he wanted to be taken out of the book. He won't be featured in the second edition. End of story.


Do you think the book is affecting change and educating people the way you hoped when developing it?

We know there are children in the U.S. and other western countries who are called "terrorists" and "Osama bin Ladin" simply because they look Middle Eastern or have an Arabic name. We hope those kids might feel empowered when reading stories of other inspiring and impressive people like themselves. Similarly, the children out there who have fallen into the role of perpetuating the terror myth might be able to learn something when seeing some of their heroes in a different light, or by discovering new heroes in unexpected places. We don't necessarily think we'll be able to open too many adult minds that are already closed, but we did want to provide a tool that more open-minded adults may use to address this difficult subject with their kids.

Having recently spent much time in South Africa, I have a close, personal connection to the region and its history. During the height of the anti-apartheid struggle, Zimbabwe provided a safe-haven for South African freedom fighters. Here, exiled South African artists Hugh Masekela and Miriam Makeba, widely known for anti-apartheid views in their music, were free to perform alongside Paul Simon in the now famous 1987 "African Concert".

Now, some 20 years later, Zimbabwe is in dire straits and risks becoming a failed democratic state after only 28 years of independence. What's more, the official stance of its neighbor, South African President Thabo Mbeki is, despite out-cries from human rights groups,"no crisis" exists in Zimbabwe.

On the heels of the recent election turmoil and violence in Kenya, secretly filmed footage from Zimbabwe has emerged showing victims of violence following the country's recent elections. The release of this footage overcomes the ban of most foreign media.

Last week, Human Rights Watch reported current President Robert Mugabe's party (ZANU-PF) is using torture camps to retaliate against those Zimbabweans that supported the opposition party, Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), in the election. According to the MDC Secretary-General, 10 people have been killed and more than 300 opposition voters have been victims of beatings and other forms of violence, while Mugabe and his government strongly deny these claims.

Following the failure to release the election results, South African President Mbeki was appointed to mediate the crisis, yet little progress has been made in releasing the results or curbing the intensifying violence.

This recent news brings the country's economic turbulence in global focus. It is estimated that 3 million people have fled to neighboring South Africa to escape the grave situation: unemployment in excess of 85%, less than a 40-year life-expectancy, and an annual inflation rate of over 165,000%. The country faces severe shortages of food, medicine, fuel, and basic necessities. It is easy to see why those in Zimbabwe risked so much to vote against Mugabe's and his economic policies.

So, who is to assume responsibility for protecting Zimbabweans from widespread violence, voter intimidation, and ending this political deadlock? If the crisis in Zimbabwe fails to be resolved quickly, will it affect all of Southern Africa through further economic instability in the region and another African refugee crisis? For years, Zimbabwe and (more recently) South Africa have represented hope for democracy and peaceful resolution in Africa. Stabilizing the situation by listening to the will of the Zimbabwe people, releasing the elections' results, and abiding by the result without further bloodshed, is the country's only hope for short-term survival. The international community must act to stop these terrible actions and restore the rule of law in Zimbabwe.

Harper's Magazine, the monthly journal of all things cultural, political, and generally curious about the world we live in, recently introduced a weekly email newsletter that features little bits of information the mainstream media might have barely mentioned, buried in the middle of the paper, or simply missed altogether.

This week's edition focuses on the Pope's visit to the United States last week, and regardless of how much you followed his activities, this exhaustive list provides some insight into how this country receives a dignitary of Pope Benedict XVI's stature.

Beyond the bizarre circus that surrounded his visit, this case is particularly interesting for one simple reason: When Joseph Alois Ratzinger was appointed to the papacy, in April, 2005, the reaction was not especially positive. He has a rather checkered past, having allegedly been a member of the Hitler Youth and served as the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith -- formerly the Holy Office of the Inquisition -- from 1981 until 2005. He was such a hard-ass conservative, in fact, he was sometimes referred to as "God's rottweiler."

Apparently, he has been much less of a staunch conservative than some feared he would be three years ago, but still, take a look at how we received him:

Pope Benedict XVI toured the United States. Kathleen Battle, Harry Connick Jr., and Kelly Clarkson serenaded him, President George W. Bush gave him a crystal cross and a birthday cake, Placido Domingo threw him a birthday party (but forgot to invite him), Jews welcomed him into a Manhattan synagogue, and fans at Yankee stadium performed the wave in his honor.

Three Girl Scouts fainted in his presence. The Senate and the House took half a day off so that more than 100 members of Congress, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader John Boehner, and Senator Edward Kennedy, could take a bus to Nationals Park, in Washington, D.C., to hear the Pope deliver Mass.

Baker Liturgical Art, LLC, the Connecticut-based clothing company hired by the Vatican, revealed that more than 150 artisans (including 50 seamstresses), and 1,500 yards of fabric were necessary to outfit the Pope and his entourage in new vestments for their 6-day stint in the United States. Brian Baker, the company's president, also created a one-size-fits-all flex-miter for the occasion.

By the time we're adults, we should have a pretty good idea of what foods will make us sick. If I'm about to pour cow's milk on my cereal, for example, I reflexively check the nose: if it's the least bit sour, I dump the whole carton. Likewise, if I see any pink in my chicken, I send it back to the kitchen, or I take it there myself if I'm at home.

But it never occurred to me that I should also be leary of alfalfa sprouts, canteloupe, or packaged salad greens.

As someone who's constantly looking for a healthier diet, this click-through annotated slideshow from MSN.com instantly caught my eye.

Since reading up on the potential benefits and dangers of unpasteurized dairy products for a previous post, however, I'm now more leary of our dietary paranoia than I am the food we eat.

On a recent trip to Paris, I was surprised to see my host lighten his coffee with milk that smelled decidedly rotten to me. He responded, "I might not drink a whole glass, but for coffee it's fine."

In other words, it's all relative.

The same friend frequently insists that one can eat chicken raw, a claim I've disputed tooth-and-nail many times.

Obviously Avian Flu, E.Coli, and Salmonella are dreaded illnesses, and should be avoided. But is MSN's list of ten "dangerous" foods valid, or just another example of our nation's collective nervous stomach?

Monday afternoon I finally made the decision to pack the kids in a rented car and drive us down to Philadelphia to Obama campaign any way we could. I had been hesitating for a few days but the thought that my kids were going to lose the opportunity of being part of something truly historic gave me palpitations. After I made a couple of phone calls I was told to go to "1352 Gerard Avenue", the person told me there was plenty of work to do in that ward.

Well.

The Obama campaign has been blessed with a grassroots bounty of donations and volunteers who are at the ready to donate their week's lunch budget or hop in their cars and drive across states to help get out the vote and canvass for the Senator.

This does not mean though that everything in the campaign runs smoothly. Case in point? When I was given the address to get to this precint office, the person said, "Use Google Maps and you'll find the address easily". Yet one wrong letter and one misspelled avenue later, I ended up what probably was the middle of nowhere in Hillaryland.

You see, "Gerard Avenue" is a little nook of street in the very upper middle class suburb of Elkins Park. It is an unincorporated community split between two townships and about 10 miles from Philadelphia's Center City.

"Girard Avenue" could not be farther away from Elkins Park. It is in the heart of North Philly's 14th Ward and if there is anyway to describe this area, one would have to compare it to the striking poverty and decay of New York's Harlem and South Bronx back in the 1980s. Nice people, neighborhood rough.

I am part of a group of political pundits who write for Personal Democracy Forum's blog on technology, politics and the presidential race, techPresident. I'm in the throes of finishing a paper they will be publishing later this year about the current state of politics and the future of it thanks (or no thanks) to technology. I find it hilarious that I ended up in the middle of nowhere thanks to one of the subjects of my essay : A digital native who thought the right answer to getting people to their campaign was to know which online mapping software instead of knowing the class, race and geographic nuance that an "E" instead of an "I" brought to my journey to the city of brotherly love.

We got off exit 6 on the New Jersey Turnpike and traveled west on Pennsylvania's own. Before getting lost in Elkins Park, we drove past farms and exurban areas until we hit the strip mall and suburban mayhem of Roosevelt Boulevard. Most people waiting for buses where Asian, Black or Latino looking. Most people in cars in this area were not.

We stopped for directions and the gas station attendant was right out of a Simpsons episode. He heckled and chased off his premises a young white dude who was hustling from a white van what the attendant describes as "stolen car stereo equipment". This happens to him now every single day. "The guy knows the police won't come for over a half an hour and that's all he needs to sell his stolen stuff". On the counter I notice he is selling lighters that look like buckshot rifles."Do you want to buy one? They're all the rage around here", he said. I said no thanks and we settled for "whoopie cushions" the kids found on a toy stand along with toy assault rifles and toy handguns and even a toy grenade.

Off we went on our journey. We drove through Cottman and past Township line. The houses went from townhouses to cottage types to huge, sprawling million dollar mansions ensconced in well manicured naturalistic setups. Past Cedar and then Harrison, the houses became more McMansiony, more cookie cutter although these neighborhoods we were driving through looked like they'd been lived in for not decades but maybe a century.

Once we hit the dead end of Gerard Avenue I asked a lady sitting on her porch for the address I was looking for: "Never heard of it". When I asked her if she knew of an Obama headquarter, she smiled and said, "There's no such thing around here".

Now, I don't know if that was true, but I can tell you that the kids were counting Obama and Clinton signs and for every five Clintons there was one Obama. My oldest son, Evan, wistfully said at one point, "this doesn't look good."

We called headquarters again and once we were set on our way, we drove all the way down Old York Road. Again we saw the strip malls and townhouses but then something happened. It was right after we passed Roosevelt Boulevard that things changed dramatically.